


va 


SS see 



























re . are 7 7 

"ERT Y OF THE INSTITUTE 

| NO. | TAKEN FROMTHIS ROOM. 
65 EBA 30TU STREET * NEW YORK 

















‘ 








GASTON LACHAISE 


SIXTEEN REPRODUCTIONS IN COLLOTYPE 
OF THE SCULPTOR’S WORK 


EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION 


BY A. E, GALLATIN 


ai) 


NEW YORK 
E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY 
1924 











Copyright 1924, by ie P. Dutton ew C ompany cee 
All rights reserved — a 


* 


ies 
or. % ’ 
: p Wie Ca a 
ital Le. 
; i 4 
i pay 
% 
‘ . 
. 
’ 7 
5 
: ! 
F. "4 
~. i 
4 
A 
im 
m } 
hot tay 
1: 
Ae 
t 1 < 
; 
‘¥ 
: 
Jt 
‘ 
a 
ee 
: 
s 
‘ 
" 
{ 
i 
i : tom 
i 
. 
1A 
« J _ e 
“2 as ee 
ins ; ‘ i 
ie 
: : i 
7 foe Bt 
{ ee | behets q 
| an > € 
cn) a3 " ALS , 
Pi ; Le fy oy 
i y A ¢) aa Aa 


OULN & oi) Ae tbh 
Pa pen 
ae 


ed bi a (e? 
re ere 


seer pel 









11S BOOK IS DEDICATED 
‘TO THE MEMORY OF , 
- MY MOTHER 











LIST OF PLATES 


The plates have been made from photographs by CHARLES SHEELER 


CON ON PW N 


. Woman's Head 

. Woman's Head 

. Womans Head 

. Portrait Head 

. Woman's Head 

. Portrait Statuette 

. Statuette 

. Figure intended for Telegraph and Telephone 


Building 


. Head of Figure intended for Telegraph and 


Telephone Building 


. Dancing Children 

. Flying Figure (plaque) 
. Woman on Horse 

. Peacock 

. Group of Peacocks 

. Leaping Dolphins 


. Sea-lion 


Marble 
Marble 
Marble 
Marble 
Bronze 
Bronze 


Bronze 


Plaster 


Bronze 
Wood 

Bronze 
Bronze 
Plaster 
Bronze 
Bronze 


Bronze 








“ 











GASTON LACHAISE 


HE career of Gaston Lachaise is well worth ex- 

amining and studying, for it presents features as 
unusual as they are full of interest. Born in Paris on 
19 March, 1882, Lachaise came to America when in 
his twenty-third year and here he has remained. It was 
only after he had left France and arrived in America 
that his genius began to assert itself, that he found the 
inspiration to create an expression of his own. The 
reason for this Lachaise has explained to us in a fore- 
word which he wrote for the catalogue of an exhi- 
bition of his sculpture, in which he said that “The 
artist coming from Europe immediately perceives that 
elementary force, which gives him enthusiasm and 
expansion,” adding that «He becomes aware that the 
soil the most fertile for the continuity of art—is here.” 
Lachaise finding the atmosphere of France uncongenial 
for creative work, but that of America most sympathetic 


3°] 


and charged with vitality, makes us think of those exiled 
Greeks who inhabited the islands of the Aegean and 
the coast of the Mediterranean, who, in the words of 
a recent critic of Greek sculpture, were «vitalized by 
transplantation to a new soil, quickened by the stimulus 
of a new intellectual atmosphere, and responded to those 
influences with a vigor which would not have been pos- 
sible in Greece itself.” 

While it is quite true that comparatively few men 
of genius have been permitted to pursue their studies 
at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts, or even to ex- 
hibit at the Salon, excepting perhaps towards the end 
of their careers, there have been a few exceptions, of 
which Gaston Lachaise is one. With respect to being 
allowed to study at the Beaux-Arts, it may be noted 
that Lachaise was more favored than Rodin. But Rodin 
at least gained entrance to the Salon, where, it may be 
noted, Lachaise exhibited in 1899, 1901 and 1903. 
Lachaise studied modeling at the Beaux-Arts from 
1898 until 1903, chiefly under Gabriel Jules Thomas, 
but the time spent there the sculptor claims profited - 
him but little, and he is convinced that the methods 
of instruction in vogue are not the correct ones. It is 


[aa | 








very easy to understand that in such academic and 
official surroundings he felt the loss of contact with 
life and consequent inability to develop his imagina- 
tion. (I remember once looking at the pictures which 
had won the Prix de Rome, extending over a hundred 
years, and without knowing what they were, thinking 
they were the work of one painter.) Much more profit- 
able Lachaise found the many hours which he passed 
at the Louvre, studying the great masterpieces of an- 
tiquity, than those spent at the Beaux-Arts. The Louvre, 
one might say, was Lachaise’s real art school, as it was 
Cézanne’s. 

Leaving France for America in 1905, Lachaise at 
first proceeded to Boston, where he worked at his call- 
ing for seven years, perfecting himself in the technique 
of his art. In 1912 he came to New York, where he 
lived until the spring of 1923, when he decided he pre- 
ferred to live in the country, and went to Georgetown, 
Maine. It was during this period of his life that Lachaise 
married, a marriage, it may be noted, that has had a 
powerful influence both on the development of his art 
and on his character. In New York Lachaise worked 


for some time for Paul Manship; he collaborated with 


[eas 43 


Manship in designing the elaborate memorial tablet to 
J. Pierpont Morgan which has been placed in the Met- 
ropolitan Museum of Art. All of the actual carving of 
this tablet was done by Lachaise. Owing to the fact that 
he has lived in America for nineteen years, that he is 
a naturalized citizen, and that his art only came into 
being after a long sojourn in America, Lachaise may 
very properly be considered an American. 

Lachaise is no more interested in recording the 
merely visual aspects of nature than were the sculp- 
tors of Greece, China or Egypt. Like them, his concern 
is with such problems as the relation of masses, with 
questions of rhythm, with the simplification of forms. 
He is thus carrying on the traditions established in the 
great periods of sculpture. Moreover, Lachaise’s images 
in stone and marble and his modeled figures, cast in 
bronze, are essentially original creations. The fact can- 
not be insisted upon too much that it is such artists 
as Lachaise, John Marin, Charles Demuth and Picasso 
who are in reality carrying on the traditions, and not 
the ineffectual academicians, with their lifeless pictures 
and parodies of other men’s work. It is quite natural 
that Lachaise’s sculpture should disturb and remain 


br] 





incomprehensible to officialdom, easy to understand 
why he is represented in no public museum, why he has 
never been given a medal ora prize. Easy to under- 
stand, for Lachaise’s work must be considered as scu/p- 
ture. And that of course is too revolutionary a point of 
view for art juries and museum committees, ready at 
all times to applaud servile imitations of nature, or of 
another man’s work, but scornful of any sculptural 
qualities. Genius they are not willing to forgive as 
lightly as all that. Or what is more likely, as Wagner 
once remarked, it takes genius to recognize genius. 
What delight one experiences in reading Walter 
Pater’s critical essays on the genius of various great 
artists—whether they be painters or sculptors! With 
what rare art does he communicate his fervor and per- 
mit us to share his enjoyment! And that, I take it, 
should be the principal aim of all criticism. It is worth 
while to recall the opening sentences of Pater’s essay on 
the poetry of Michelangelo, in which he enumerates 
some of the elements which are common to all vital 
art, for they make an excellent avenue of approach to 
a correct understanding and appreciation of the art 
of Gaston Lachaise. Pater tells us that one is invari- 


Fra 


ably surprised and excited in the presence of a true work 
of art, but we must be charmed as well, he continues, — 
and the strangeness must be a lovely strangeness, such 
as the blossoming of the aloe. Writing to-day in New 
York, Pater might have had something to say about 
the “bite” or “kick” existing in significant works of 
art; these adjectives, at any rate, are quite expressive. 

Contemplating the bronzes and the marble and stone 
heads of Lachaise, one experiences the emotions noted 
by Pater. Studying Lachaise’s work, one realizes that it 
is thoroughly alive and that his conceptions are entirely 
his own. One perceives, also, that Lachaise possesses 
a profound knowledge of the fundamentals of his art. 
And of the greatest importance is the fact that his art is 
of his epoch, for if it were not, his learning and tech- 
nical equipment would count for but little. Lacking a 
modern note, it would be of no more consequence than 
are the marbles of Canova, Thorvaldsen and Flaxman 
—dead husks and left-over mannerisms of another age. 
Let it not be forgotten that the marbles of Phidias, 
Michelangelo and Houdon were modern in concep- 
tion, contemporaneous, and that it is fatal for the artist 
to neglect the movement of life going on around him. 


[ye] 





In the course of several very interesting conversa- 
tions held with Lachaise in his New York studio, on 
Sixth Avenue, elevated trains the while crashing past, 
the sculptor discussed his art with much eloquence. 
Keenly intelligent, the sincerity and the simplicity of 
the artist find their counterpart in his work. It is the 
fundamentals which interest him, and always he is en- 
deavoring to simplify, and simplify his art still more. 

As yet Lachaise’s choice of subject has been con- 
fined almost exclusively to delineations of women— 
women’s heads and statuettes and bas-reliefs of women, 
both clothed and nude —and studies of peacocks and 
dolphins, as well as a sea-lion and a horse. So far he 
has not attempted sculpture of a monumental charac- 
ter, on a grand scale, or produced work heroic in size, 
with the exception of a large female nude statue. He 
is, however, only waiting for an opportunity. Nor has 
Lachaise often attempted to group figures in compo- 
sitions, although on several occasions he has done this 
very successfully. Such problems do not interest him; 
he considers that more importance attaches to the de- 
lineation of a single figure. 


The massive women’s heads which Lachaise has cut 


9] 


in stone or marble are marvels of structural simplifica- 
tion and most impressive in their solidity, nobility and 
calmness. A genuine emotional quality is there. Study- 


ing these heads, one perceives that Lachaise, like Mail- 


lol, has «returned to the architectural basis of sculp-_ 


ture.” Itis most interesting to note that Lachaise often 
stains or gilds portions of his marble and stone heads, 
as did the Greeks, the Egyptians and the Gothic sculp- 
tors, and it is to be hoped that other sculptors will 
make experiments similar to these, uniting color with 
form. It seems curious to feel obliged to note the fact 
that Lachaise always chisels these heads himself, occa- 
sionally directly from the stone or marble, without first 
modeling them in clay—the latter quite a feat. Natu- 
rally, this contact with the material is absolutely essen- 
tial if the sculptor desires any quality in his work, neces- 
sary, indeed, if he wishes it to be considered an original 
work of art. That the vast majority of contemporary 
sculptors elect to have their works cast in plaster, pointed 
up, and then mechanically reproduced by a man who 
makes a profession of doing this, simply puts such 
work in the same class as copies. They are no more 
originals than a modern copy of a Donatello would be 


[ 10 | 





a Donatello. One of the plates in this volume is a re- 
production of a photograph of a head in marble which 
is a portrait, but the others were chiseled without the 
use of models. Looking at these serene creations, it is 
interesting to recall the prophecy made by Rodin some 
years ago, when, lost in admiration beforea black marble 
figure which had been brought to Turin from Egypt, 
he said: «‘ We are too uneasy, too agitated, to-day, but 
we shall return to this art of vigorous health and this 
will become the art of future centuries.”’ 

The most important full-length image Lachaise has 
executed is a study for an heroic figure intended to be 
placed in the Telegraph and Telephone Building on 
Broadway. If the directors of this company decide to 
have this projet carried out, the figure, after still fur- 
ther simplifications, would be cut in marble and stand 
about twenty-two feet high. Placed in the vast and 
imposing room which forms the ground floor of this 
building, against a marble wall and facing the princi- 
pal entrance, viewed through a vista of columns, the 
statue would be seen to great advantage. In this superb 
creation of Lachaise’s the serene figure of the young 
woman, classic in its simplicity, and full of grace, is 


[ur ] 


seen holding in one hand a globe of the world, while 
in the other rest several towering skyscrapers, which 
have become symbolical of New York. An extremely 
beautiful creation, very sculpturesque, and possessed of 
ereat style, if it is cut in marble it will surely rank with 
the most important artistic achievements of our gen- 
eration. Here then is a great opportunity for the direc-_ 
tors of the company for whose building this figure 
is intended to assume the rdle of patron of the fine 
arts, to bring vast credit upon themselves and to give 
encouragement to the whole movement for better art 
in this country. Having had the great sagacity to select 
Lachaise (or permitted the architects to do $0) to de- 
sign the really charming frieze for their building, let 
it be hoped that the officials of this company will now 
give this further commission. It is a figure admirably 
suited for the space it is intended to adorn and would 
bring together all the features of the vast chamber into 
an harmonious whole. Moreover, it is an admirable 
symbol and expression of the company’s activities. As 
in the past it was the great king or pope who, through 
his patronage, made it possible for the artist to pro- 
duce his art, so now it is on the business kings that the 


[ 12 ] 








architect, painter and sculptor must very largely de- 
pend for opportunities to give birth to their dreams. 

In addition to this figure designed for the Telegraph 
and Telephone Building, Lachaise has modeled several 
statuettes, which have been cast in bronze. Perhaps the 
most successful of these is the figure of a girl, clothed 
in a dress with a voluminous skirt, seen standing, with 
her hands upon her hips; it is a beautiful example of 
Lachaise’s art. Less significant, because apparently not 
studied as much, and not quite as simple in its bal- 
anced volumes, is the full-length, very lightly draped 
figure of a girl, although its gracefulness makes it one 
of the sculptor’s most charming creations. 

' Lachaise’s genius in many instances has soared to 
its greatest heights in his studies of animals. In these 
creations his love of voluptuous and swelling forms has 
found full play. Possessed of great style and highly 
decorative are both of his interpretations of peacocks. 
One of these, showing three peacocks, the centre one 
in the composition with his tail spread, is very hand- 
some; the other is a peacock seen perched upon a 
globe, forming a rich harmony of undulating forms. 
A group of four leaping dolphins, as well as the tail 

[gel 


of another which has disappeared under the water, is 
the subject of another bronze. These fish disporting 
themselves possess a rhythm of singular beauty. In 
another work the sculptor has again utilized the dol- 
phin, this time to form handles for a swimming pool. 
Also a masterpiece of stylistic animal interpretation is 
Lachaise’s imposing sea-lion, seen raising his head with 
a superb gesture above his massive body, the thick folds 
of fat quivering with life. In passing, let it be noted 
that one day we hope Lachaise will essay a study of an 
elephant. In another bronze the sculptor has given us 
a beautiful series of curves: upon a stocky horse, whose 
hindquarters and whose neck almost form circles, is 
seated a nude woman of ample proportions. The sense 
of rhythm in this group is as noteworthy as that in the 
leaping dolphins. 








Mien iG : es - 
ret aa a a a 
fie! vas 
ct Rhee 4 


vine 
ic 
; 




















) 








v 





< ve ¥ * de Lanier ee eo LAU paras 
Prine a i ay vi ‘yi a , mn bi x 
' a 14)" a | a me 
Pd é \ 4 Ae i ‘ ah ’ aN 











ee ae 




















Wait 


a OMA ne 
bh ‘. hold \ a) 





PIRES 





























10 




















12 














13 


AS 


at 


ay J 











rositl 


PAIL 


14 











a 










MEGS RTey 


ak gee 






RTS 


15 























LIST OF WORKS 
BY GASTON LACHAISE 


1906-1917 


Series of twenty-five small figures. 


1912 
Woman. Life-size figure. 


1914-1920 


Series of twelve bas-reliefs. 


1QI7 
Head of Woman. 


Head of Woman. 
Head of Woman. 
Leaping Dolphins. 
Woman on Horseback. 


Flying Figure. Plaque. 


1918 
Woman. Bas-relief. 
Sea-lion. 
Group of Three Peacocks. 
Woman. Bas-relief. 


Woman. Bas-relief. 


IQig 
La Montagne. 


Woman. Standing figure. 
Portrait of my Wife. Seated figure. 


Pepe 


Bronze 


Plaster 


Bronze 


Marble 
Sandstone 
Sandstone 

Bronze 

Bronze 


Bronze 


Marble 
Bronze 
Bronze 
Alabaster 
Alabaster 


Stone 


Bronze 


Plaster (to be cast in bronze) 


1920 


Head of Woman. Heroic. Marble 
Seated Figure of a Woman. Bronze 
Two Standing Peacocks. Life-size. Stone 
1921 

Frieze of fourteen panels for Telephone and Telegraph 

Building, New York. Marble 
Small model of figure proposed for Telephone and 

Telegraph Building. Plaster 
Flying Figures. Bronze 


Portrait bust of Mrs. Marie Pierce. Plaster (to be cut in marble) 


1922 
Dancing Children. Wood 
Portrait bust of Mrs. Eda Hartman Boyle. Plaster 
(to be cast in bronze) 
Portrait statuette of Mrs. B. Hartman. i: Bronze 
Head of Woman. Heroic. _ Marble 
Head of Woman. Polished bronze 
1923 
Four life-size figures of women. Panels. Cement 
Head of Woman. Marble 
Candelabrum. | Bronze 
Woman. Full-length, standing. Marble 
Portrait bust of Miss Kraushaar. Marble 


[528] 








hPa a 


A much nee version of the same subject 
1919. Bie: Saou nuads 
El ny eae os a Woman. Bronze 

Sez te d : Figure of a ‘Woman. | Bronze 
tr | ence. of Dr. L. Pierce Clark. Plaster (é be cast in bronze) 
it bust of Scofield Thayer, Esq. Bronze 
rait statuette of Miss Marjorie Spencer. | Bronze 


a4 statuette of Mrs. J. Le Watson, Jr. Bronze 


Plaster (to be cast in bronze) 







¢ eee hs 
1) re Ny 
hbial cub 
Ph. Scat a 


J ty yA ht P> 
' ‘ ; ; ; 
a ie Mi rey ‘ ay \ 
ave% ale : A oy me 
: . . ‘ 
a Ps 7 A‘ 
4 A ie 20h et ib, M4 oe dye: 5 
Leu oi he al are ey a d oN b 
on FR ww AES 
q fe 4 P pn WP eh rake 
Wik ‘ a fy i 
i : iss ) 
\ Atw 
, J ‘ 





Of this Book 400 copies sisea: printed 
by D. B. Updike ane 
The Merrymount Press, Boston 
“‘fune, 1924 





Uniform with this Volume 


American Water-Colourists 


By A. E. Gatiatin 


A Critical Essay which emphasizes the importance of the work of 
Marin and Demuth. Whistler, Sargent, Homer, Cassatt, Hassam, 
MacKnight, Gay and Burchfield are among the other artists whose 


work 1s passed in review. 


EXTRACTS FROM REVIEWS 


‘The important event of the week is the appearance in the bookshops of an essay 
by A. E. Gallatin upon American water-colourists. This is a work of courage 
and understanding. Init the problems of the day are faced unflinchingly and the 
new artists are judged sympathetically. ... I believe Mr. Gallatin’s book will 
wake up these sleeping intellects (7.2. “official philistines”) with a vengeance. 
Henry McBride in New York Herald. 


To the serious student it is indispensable, treating as it does a phase of American 


art too frequently slurred by both artists and critics. San Francisco Argonaut. 


Mr. Gallatin’s review of the masters whom he has selected for inclusion in the 
volume presents a finely balanced interpretation of their art, and will enhance 


his already well-established reputation as a critic. The Outlook. 


Format by Bruce Rocers. With thirty plates, eight in colour 


Price, $15.00 


E. P. Dutton & Company, Publishers 


681 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 




















ee eT ITE DIP ETT TI POE TE ADEE TRY 








